What Cultural,Critical and Communication Might Mean—And Why Cultural Studies Is a Bit Like Rave Culture

Responding to the editor's request for reflections on the key terms in the title of this journal, this somewhat autobiographical and possibly self-indulgent piece reflects on their changing meanings and on the ways in which cultural studies has changed and declined since the early 1990s. Cultural studies, the piece asserts, is a bit like rave culture, because like that subcultural formation of music and dance, it was big and quite innovative in the 1990s, but lost its edge in the twenty first century – although interesting offshoots continue beyond the places where it ‘originated’. The piece also suggests some reasons for the decline of cultural studies. More importantly, it tries to understand the term ‘critical’ via politics. It expresses some preferences, in terms of what constitutes good critical writing, and outlines some key elements of good critical analysis of culture.     

Retrospective on Latin@ Rhetorical-Performance Scholarship: From “Chicano Communication” to “Latina/o Communication?”

This essay is a retrospective of Latina/o rhetorical and performance scholarship in which relevant themes and directions from the past 30 years are discerned. Identified are four periods beginning in a stage of recognition, progressing to integration, marked by a (re)turn and currently at re-politicalization. Within these periods two areas have been made explicit, namely, “Chicano communication” and “Latina/o communication” which I argue are parallel endeavors pursuing different yet complementary objectives that participate in reconstitution.     

“Real-Time” Case Studies in Organizational Communication

Objective: This activity integrates theory and application by examining the multiple communication events affecting a single organization in “real time” over the course of an academic term

Course: Advanced-Level Organizational Communication Course     

Reevaluating “The End of Mass Communication?”

It is hard to imagine a more challenging arena for communication research than that presented by new media and their impact on our society. We have witnessed the fastest evolution in communication technology in human history and, along with it, the evolution of communication conceptions and theories used to assess its impact. More than a decade has passed since Chaffee and Metzger first published their intriguing article “The End of Mass Communication?” and suggested that the new media will change the notions of mass communication and, as a result, the theories used in communication research. Today, we know more about new media and its effect on communication, society, and communication theories. The present article, therefore, sets out to reassess Chaffee and Metzger's claim by describing the development of several core theories of communication research, namely the agenda-setting theory and the notions of media audiences and the Digital Divide, in light of the new media. Our review shows that the role played by communication technologies in social, cultural, political, and economic processes is as central and influential in the new media era as it was in traditional media environment and that, although theories may change to accommodate the changes of the new media environment, researchers are still dealing with the “old” issues of power and resistance, and structure and ownership.     

Rethinking “Difficult” Conversations in Communication Instruction From an Intercultural Lens: Pedagogical Strategies for “SWAP-ping” the Communication Classroom

Intercultural communication offers both theoretical and pedagogical implications for communication instruction. As such, we interweave theories and concepts of intercultural communication and instructional communication in (re)thinking “difficult,” “sensitive,” or “uncomfortable” classroom conversations that involve privilege, power, and intersecting cultural identities (e.g., racism). In juxtaposing these areas side by side, we first interrogate why intercultural and instructional communication scholars have neglected what the other takes as central: pedagogy and diversity. In particular, we ask: Why are certain conversations deemed “difficult” in the mainstream communication classroom? To whom are they difficult conversations? Why might these conversations feel “uncomfortable or risky”? Second, we crystalize how intercultural communication makes strides toward feeling/thinking/understanding difficult conversations in ways that promote social justice by proposing a pedagogy of “SWAP-ping” the communication classroom.     

WTF was Kony 2012? Considerations for Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies (CCCS)

This article discusses the (in)famous Kony 2012 (Kony) viral video, which had a record-100 million views in six days. It discusses its unique status as a viral advocacy video by NGO Invisible Children (IC) to make Joseph Kony “famous.” Theorizing Kony's eventfulness entails insights for twenty-first-century communication and critical cultural studies, which note the obsolescence of past critical trends in CCCS: especially regarding virality, imitation, attention, affect, citizenship, subjectivity, power, control, participation, and protest.     

The Family Environment of “Quick-Witted” Persons: Birth Order,Family Communication Patterns,and Creative Facility

“Creative facility” refers to the ease, rapidity, or fluency with which people are able to formulate and produce novel, appropriate messages. Previous research indicates that people differ in this regard and that the phenomenon is linked to various personality and cognitive-style variables. This study aims to investigate whether aspects of family structure (i.e., birth order) and family processes (i.e., family communication patterns) are related to creative facility. Results indicated a significant interaction between birth order and family conversation orientation such that, for first-borns, higher levels of conversation orientation were associated with slower message production. No effects were observed for family conformity orientation. Among the implications of the findings is the need to assess birth order in studies of family communication patterns.     

“Actually,I Don't Eat Meat”: A Multiple-Goals Perspective of Communication About Vegetarianism

Engaging in non-mainstream behavior can be challenging to negotiate communicatively, especially when it involves the simple but necessary task of eating, a lifelong activity that is often done in others’ company. Through face-to-face, semi-structured interviews of 20 vegetarians, this study used a multiple-goals perspective (Goldsmith, 2004 Goldsmith , D. J. ( 2004 ). Communicating social support . Cambridge , England : Cambridge University Press .[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]; Goldsmith, Gumminger, & Bute, 2006 Goldsmith , D. J. , Gumminger , K. L. , & Bute , J. J. ( 2006 ). Communication about lifestyle change between cardiac patients and their partners . In R. M. Dailey & B. A. LePoire (Eds.), Applied interpersonal communication matters: Family, health, and community relations (pp. 95 – 117 ). New York , NY : Peter Lang . [Google Scholar]) to examine the communicative dilemmas faced by vegetarians. This investigation suggests unique self-presentational challenges for vegetarians (e.g., being true to oneself yet fitting in; talking about vegetarianism without judging others) and identifies strategies that “healthy deviants”—people who violate society's norms in relatively healthy ways—can use to discuss their lifestyle choices. Findings offer practical implications for how communication can help people enact or sustain potentially stigmatized healthy lifestyles while maintaining their relationships.     

In Defense of “Mass Communication” and Other Stuff

A consistent news frame that deligitmizes and depicts most social protests as "police vs. protesters" has been identified in studies of news coverage of social movements. This study used an experimental design to examine the extent to which photographs and prior attitudes toward protests and protesters in general contribute to previously identified framing effects of protest news. Results indicated that for the protest issue of interest evaluations of the protest and protesters were more negative when photos depicting higher levels of conflict were shown. The amount of conflict shown in the photos did not affect evaluations of the protest and protesters when the issue was of less interest to participants. Additionally, participants who had more positive prior attitudes toward protesting in general were more likely to identify with the protesters in the stimulus story and to perceive that the protest was more effective than were those with more negative prior attitudes. Findings suggest the need to address possible nuances associated with the visuals alone and to incorporate prior attitudes when examining effects of news coverage of protests.     

“We Do It,but They Don't”: Multiple Categorizations and Work Team Communication

The present study adopted an intergroup approach to information sharing and ratings of work team communication in a public hospital (N?=?142) undergoing large-scale restructuring. Consistent with predictions, ratings of communication followed a double ingroup serving bias: while team members reported sending about the same levels of information to double ingroup members (same work team/same occupational group) as they did to partial ingroup members (same work team/different occupational group), they reported receiving less information from partial ingroup members than from double ingroup members and rated the communication that they received from partial ingroup members as less effective. We discuss the implication of these results for the management of information sharing and organizational communication.     

Engaging “Others” in Civic Engagement through Ethnography of Communication

This essay explains how ethnography of communication informed a model of public participation designed to engage underserved populations in culturally sensitive deliberative discussions. Community college students successfully served as coresearchers to pilot test and assess the effectiveness of a community-service learning model of civic engagement research.     

“Cultumization?” The Impact of Cultural Priming on Customized Communication

This study examined the impact of cultural priming on the effects of customized communication. Two existing customization approaches (tailoring and targeting) were tested with 102 participants in an experiment. It was found that when participants were primed with individualistic meanings, they tended to generate a more favorable attitude toward tailored messages than targeted messages. In contrast, when participants were primed with collectivist meanings, they formed a more favorable attitude toward targeted messages than tailored ones. Based on the study findings, the conceptualization of customization needs to incorporate the cultural factor.     

Journalism and Critical Engagement: Naiveté, Embarrassment,and Intelligibility

This article explores the possibility of journalists acting as custodians of critical engagement, drawing on Rancière's conception of dissensus as organized disagreement over the conditions of understanding. It begins by assessing the status that worthiness and naiveté have as negative symbolic capital in the journalistic field, before asking whether journalists' ambivalent detachment from the objects of their inquiry hinders their ability to engage critically with experts in other fields. It argues that journalism's role in marshaling dissensus amounts to making clear the limits and absences of intelligibility in journalism and other fields, in distinction to disseminating knowledge as such.     

Making the “minority” voice heard: Critical communication pedagogy and dissent

ABSTRACT

Courses: Intercultural Communication, Argumentation and Advocacy, Communication and Education

Objectives: This activity is designed to help students to problem-pose and think critically about policies/laws that influence education. Students will be exposed to U.S. policy and will be able to articulate a critical dissent of such documents.     

“势”,“时”,“术”与广告创意

广告作为一种传递信息的形式,在商品和商品交换刚一产生就出现了,只是由于受到社会、经济发展水平和人类传播工具的制约,早期的广告其功能形态都十分简单,仅仅止于“告知”而已。 １９世纪上半叶,西方一些发达国家率先将古老的广告术和大众传媒结合在一起,广泛地运用于商业活动,从而大大扩展了广告的功能和价值。一个个杰出的广告人才随之脱颖而出。大卫·奥格威、克劳德·霍普金斯、雷蒙·罗必凯等广告大师在长期的广告活动中巧妙地将广告与营销、广告与传播紧密结合在一起,从而将广告战略和广告技巧置于科学化的基础上,建立了广…     

The Beginnings of Radio Communication in Germany, 1897–1918

This article surveys the prehistory of broadcasting in the German Reich. It focuses on wireless telegraphy, where the Telefunken Company succeeded internationally with its quenched spark system on the eve of the war. Telefunken's system was developed as an efficient military technology between 1905 and 1908, and it soon became the core of Telefunken's successful attempt to break Marconi's monopoly in maritime radio communication. Encouraged by this success, Telefunken started to establish wireless transoceanic connections to build a global German radio network. The properties of radio broadcasting as a possible new mass medium only gradually became evident before 1918.